Daily Yellowstone journal., 1887-12-18
JERSEY CRANBERRY MARSHES.

The Thrifty Bush's Three Enemies
Flooding the Bog-Picksrs at Work.
There are between 5000 and 5000
acres of New Jersey marsh under sran-
berry cultivation to-day, which is about
one-quarter of the cranberry growing
area Of the United States, Massachu-
setts and Wisconsin being the other
principal growers of the fruit. A cram
berry marsh of the present day is as
handsome plat of green things grow
ing as the eye could rest upon, but the
rearing of the bushes on a new bog to
the age of fruit bearing is attended with
no end Of care and toll, to say moth
ing Of the expense. Since the cultivation
of cranberries assumed the proportions
of large and in portant agricultural pur-
suit in New Jersey, three enemies, not
one of which assailed the bush in its wild
state, have arisen up against tia grass,
q b1rush and an insect. After a new
marsh or swamp has been cleared. ditch
ed and sanded, it is planted by takings
or slips from old bushes and inserting
one end of them in the layer of sand on
sio pat Sli' "hioh 70 Pusheu Siooeiy
about the slips. Cranberry slips soon
take root in the generous peat, and begin
TO grow almost Immediately. They
spread rapidly over the marsh, but be-
fore they have reached out their branches
many days the planter finds them sur
rounded and choked by the sharp edged,
stiff leaved, three square grass. and its
inevitable coadJutor, the hardy and per-
sistent bulrush.
The grass and the rushes must be re-
moved root and branch. for which pnr-
=, pose curious gouges and peculiar hoes
and other implements have been devised.
These pestiferous weeds have to be con-
stantly watched, and uprooted every
week or 30 for two seasons, so thoroughly
impregnated does the soil seem to be
with their germs and so rapidly do they
develop. AT the end OF the second year
the cranberry bushes have obtained such
strength and headway that they cover the
ground all over the bog like an immense
velvety mat OF emerald and have choked
the enterprising grass and rushes out of
existence. IL is estimated that TO foster
cranberry bog to this state of its exist.
ence costs the owner 800 an acre. II a
man should want to buy 2-year-old bog,
thrifty and in perfect condition, he would
be lucky il he could obtain it for less than
5000 an acre.
Cranberry bushes blossom at the be-
ginning Of the third season, and from
that time on the grower may expect a
visit from the webworm, the most
dreaded enemy Of the bog. A singular
characteristic Of this insect is that it never
gives warning Of its coming on a marsh.
The cranberry grower may go to bed at
night without having been able TO dis
cover sign Of webworm on his bushes,
and get up next morning TO see the marsh
look as if it were covered with miniature
banks OF fog, and the tops Of the bushes
drawn together so tightly that twlne
he'd around them could hardly make
them any closer. The light banks Of fog
are the webs Of the worm, which have
been constructed during the night, and
are what pulls the tops Of the vines to-
gether. In day or so the vines turn
yellow, and the blossoms drop to the
ground, and the owner of that marsh
does not make any very large calcula-
lions ON profits that year. About the
first Of November they are submerged
under five or six feet Of water with which
the bogs are artificially flooded. This
water is drawn off about the middle Of
May, and the bushes come to view as
fresh and green as June clover field.
There were picked last year in the New
Jersey marshes nearly 200, 900 bushels OF
cranberries, which were sold at an av-
erage price of 81 bushel. The yield
this year will not be more than two
thirds Of last years, but it is expected